Have you ever planted a garden? It is a real pleasure to see a garden where all of the plants lie in neat rows and are healthy and thriving. Plants need sunlight and nutritious soil to grow and be healthy, right? Not always! Hydroponics is the science of growing plants in nutrient-rich water. Does it work? Try this project and see for yourself!
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PlantBio_p045

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Time Required

Very Long (1+ months)

Prerequisites

None

Material Availability

Cost

Average ($50 - $100)

Safety

Use gloves and safety goggles when handling chemicals. Adult supervision is required.

You might not know it, but a lake without algae would be a very dull place. If there were no algae, there would be no small animals feeding on the algae, and there wouldn't be any fish eating the small animals that eat the algae. You might conclude that since some algae is good, more algae is even better, but algae growth has a down side. If there is too much algae, they can deplete the oxygen in the water, killing off other species in the water. What is one culprit that leads to algal growth?…
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EnvSci_p054

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Time Required

Very Long (1+ months)

Prerequisites

Material Availability

You will need access to a pond or a lake from which to collect water. Students who do not have access to a pond or a lake might want to look at some of the variations, at the end of the project, which use purchased algae cultures.

Every day farmers around the world apply commercial fertilizer to their fruits and vegetables to improve plant health and yield. But applying commercial fertilizer is expensive and not economically possible for some farmers in developing countries. What if they could find a way to fertilize plants cheaply? It turns out that human urine is rich in the nutrients that plants need to grow. Could urine serve as a fertilizer substitute? Find out for yourself in this plant growth science project.
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PlantBio_p046

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Time Required

Very Long (1+ months)

Prerequisites

None

Material Availability

To do this project, you will need dirt without any added fertilizer. See the Materials and Equipment list for details.

Cost

Low ($20 - $50)

Safety

Use caution when handling human urine. Wear gloves when working with human urine. Adult supervision is recommended.

Make your own fertile soil using kitchen scraps, manure, leaves, grass clippings, and other compostable materials. Which materials make the best compost? How does the amount of nitrogen change the rate at which the compost forms? How does a 'hot' compost pile compare to a 'cold' compost pile, or how does traditional composting compare to worm composting, or vermiculture?
Figure 1. Different composting methods yield different soils. In this picture, the soil on the left is vermicompost (the…
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Do you know what plants need to grow? Sure, they need soil, water, and sunshine.
Everyone knows that. But here's a secret: they also need nitrogen. Plants use nitrogen to make DNA in their cells and
the proteins that lead to healthy stems and leaves. The problem is, although the Earth's
atmosphere is made up of 78% nitrogen, the form of nitrogen found in the atmosphere cannot be used by plants.
So how do plants get their nitrogen? Either through nitrogen deposits in the soil, or through…
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Plants need nitrogen to grow healthy stems and leaves. Although nitrogen is the most abundant element in the air we breathe, that form of nitrogen cannot be used by plants. Nitrogen contained in fertilizer, on the other hand, is readily taken up by plants. In this experiment, you will compare plants grown without nitrogen fertilizer to plants grown with nitrogen fertilizer.
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Interested in helping the environment, and don't mind getting dirty? In this project you get to mix it up with earthworms, soil, and various types of organic kitchen scraps. The basic idea is to set up small earthworm colonies to compost different types of food waste. You test the soils in each type to see how diet affects both the earthworm population and the nutrients they put back into the soil. This project takes a little time, but it's worth it. You'll help the environment and learn…
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Did you know that apple trees do not "breed true"? This means that if you plant seeds from an apple, say a Granny Smith, you will get apple trees, but they will make apples that are actually different than Granny Smiths. So how do farmers produce new Granny Smith trees? They use a method called vegetative propagation. For instance, they may cut a branch off of a tree that grows Granny Smith apples and attach the branch onto a different tree trunk. This method of making new trees is called…
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The sustainability of our ocean fisheries is a topic of concern for many, including environmentalists and fishermen who make their living on the bounty of the sea. It is important to use sustainable fishing practices so that our fisheries are not over-fished leading to a decline in productivity. Some states require fish markets to post information about their fish so that consumers can make informed decisions about which fish to buy. They post the type of fish (e.g., Coho Salmon), the source of…
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Mushrooms are not plants, but are fungi. Fungi include mushrooms, molds, and lichen. They do not produce seeds to reproduce like some plants. Fungi produce spores, like more primitive plants do. The spores of a mushroom are contained in the tiny folds around the stem underneath the mushroom cap. Different species of mushrooms have different types of spores, with different colors and different patterns of folds. You can make mushroom prints by removing the stem from a mushroom and placing the…
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PlantBio_p026

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Time Required

Very Long (1+ months)

Prerequisites

None

Material Availability

This project requires access to a place where mushrooms grow wildly (and you have permission to harvest them) or the purchase of a mushroom growing kit from an .

You can find this page online at: http://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/search.shtml?v=solt&pi=EnvEng_p032.shtml

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